Superbowl at Sea: Marines Prep for Huge Wargame with Gridiron Fight

ABOARD THE U.S.S. WASP — Very early Monday morning, over 14,000 U.S. sailors, Marines and their foreign allies will launch the most ambitious naval war game in a decade, testing their ability to come ashore by sea and air from dozens of miles out in the Atlantic Ocean against a hostile force, (hopefully) demonstrating that amphibious warfare is back after ten years of grueling land battles. And tonight, in the hangar deck of this 40,000-ton assault ship, no one cares.

Because tonight is Super Bowl XLVI.

The training exercise called Bold Alligator is unofficially on pause for the rematch of the dramatic 2008 Patriots-Giants Super Bowl. Hundreds of enlisted sailors and Marines watching the game in the ship’s hangar deck aren’t interested in rehearsing the complex flight, landing craft and logistics plans for the evening. They wonder about Tom Brady’s plans to escape the Giants’ pass rush; about the Patriots’ questionable secondary defense against the Giants’ deep threats of Mario Manningham, Hakeem Nicks and Victor Cruz; about how a Giants team that finished the regular season a pathetic 9-7 stands a chance against the most dominant NFL team of the last decade.

Inevitably, the answers came. The Giants took the rematch, 21-17, on the strength of a crucial 40-yard Manning-to-Manningham completion, some savvy delays to drain away the clock ahead of the final Giants touchdown with a minute left in the game, and an inadvertent first-quarter assist by Brady to hand the G-men a free two points. Giants fans took over the hangar deck, blowing whistles, jeering Brady, and turning the decibel level to a sonic boom.

Bold Alligator is for tomorrow, and tomorrow is a very long way away.

The cold, cavernous hangar deck bearing the Wasp’s logo was bathed in green light for the game, almost like night vision, except for a screen fit for a small movie theater projecting the game via satellite. It’s deafeningly loud until the National Anthem starts; when the song ends, so does the silence. A huge cheer goes out when the cameras cut to a shot of soldiers and Marines in southern Afghanistan’s Camp Leatherneck. A second goes out for the game’s first beer commercial, since the ship is dry.

Navy and Marine aviators in khaki jumpsuits talk trash about how Brady wears man-Uggs or how Manning isn’t even the best quarterback with his last name. Everyone can agree on one thing: these are two teams with explosive offenses and mediocre defenses — kind of the way they themselves want to perform against the war game’s fictitious enemy.

It felt like the calm before the storm all day aboard the U.S.S. Wasp, and not because of the impending amphibious mission. (Well, sort of: it literally stormed on Sunday morning, 60 miles out into the Atlantic from North Carolina.) I learned that by soliciting the opinions of service members through an innovative reporting strategy: walking the decks of the ship outfitted in the blue #80 jersey of the Giants’ Cruz.

A very unscientific sample indicated that a plurality of the Wasp‘s crew was rooting for the G-Men — some because, like the Navy senior enlisted man in the ship’s flight control station, they’re from the broader New York-New Jersey area; others because, in the words of one Marine, they “don’t [expletive deleted] with the Patriots.” There are, of course, exceptions, like the several sailors and Marines who informed me I had the wrong jersey on.

Interviews also revealed something else: there’s no obvious division in fandom between the Navy and the Marine Corps. And that’s auspicious for Bold Alligator.

Both services fall under the Department of the Navy. But for a decade, they haven’t fought alongside one another at sea. The Marines have been too busy in Iraq and Afghanistan. But as the land wars recede and the U.S.’ defense strategy looks west to the deep, blue Pacific, the Navy and the Marines are re-learning how to attack an enemy from the water, as one force.

Adm. Jonathan Greenert, the Navy’s new top officer, didn’t bother concealing his pride when he came aboard Saturday, greeted by a phalanx of sailors and marines in the Wasp’s hangar deck. “Seeing this blue-green field,” Greenert said, “has been a long time coming.”

Since 2006, to be exact, when Greenert and his Marine counterpart, Gen. James Amos, began planning what would become Bold Alligator — an exercise continuously delayed by the Marines’ extended stays fighting through Iraq’s Anbar Province and Afghanistan’s Helmand Province. Greenert worries about a generation of Navy officers who don’t know how to plan an amphibious assault; Amos worries about a generation of Marines who came of age acting like a second land Army.

The past week has been a reacquaintance. Thirty-one ships — including some from nine foreign allies’ seafarers — have sailed into the waters off the Atlantic coast, including the carrier strike group of the U.S.S. Enterprise. Amphibious Assault Vehicles and Landing Craft Air Cushioned vessels are ready to bring Marines ashore, backed up by MV-22 Ospreys and SH-60 helicopters, with Harrier jets overhead and minesweepers out front hunting ersatz mines. The 14,350 sailors and Marines aboard the Bold Alligator craft are supposed to fight as one team — and on Sunday, they’re also united for the NFL’s biggest game.

Another point of agreement: how grateful people are to watch the game on regular American TV, rather than the Armed Forces Network, which has denied troops deployed for a decade in the Middle East the best commercials of the year. (Early consensus: the new Sasha Baron Cohen movie looks awesome.) One Marine enlisted man playing cards with his buddies during the endless hours before the Super Bowl remarks that he just wants to see the halftime show, “to see how nasty Madonna is.”

The Navy and Marines may not have fought together in a decade, but they heckle together like a well-oiled machine. To break the monotony of Pats and Giants fans competing for a psychological advantage, cheers go out for the Falcons, the Browns, Tim Tebow. When a Hyundai commercial falls flat, someone yells: “Tom Brady drives a Hyundai!” Mocking rhythmic claps go out during Madonna’s “Like A Prayer” halftime performance, followed by huge boos for her “World Peace” display.

Huge boos also go out in the second and fourth quarters, when the ship loses the satellite signal at crucial moments, leaving only a massive blue screen of death when hundreds of troops need to know if Manningham’s catch is going to be ruled incomplete. If the communications gear performs as poorly during Bold Alligator, it’s not a good sign.

But perhaps the best sign comes after the Giants’ victory. While Pats fans grouse and Giants fans celebrate, the deck clears out in a crush of humanity — Greenert’s desired sea of blue and green uniforms, indistinguishable under the spooky green lights. It only takes seconds after a hard-fought and hard-cheered game for the Navy and the Marine Corps to finally become a single team.